


Ten Minutes

by Diary



Category: Scandal (TV)
Genre: Bechdel Test Fail, Canon Gay Character, Canon Queer Character, Conversations, Disturbing Themes, Gen, POV Cyrus Beene, POV Male Character, POV Queer Character, Pre-Season/Series 05
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-23
Updated: 2016-04-23
Packaged: 2018-06-03 22:13:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6628717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Diary/pseuds/Diary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cyrus visits Tom in prison. Complete.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ten Minutes

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Scandal.

Sitting down, Tom stays still while the guards cuff him to the table. When they’ve left the room, he says, “I don’t get visitors.”

Cyrus Beene scoffs. “I can’t imagine why.”

“Did the president send you?”

“If the president sent anybody, it’d be to kill you,” Cyrus responds. “Here’s how this is going to go: This is my only visit. There isn’t much I can do for you, but there are certain things I could. I need information. Give it to me, and within reason, I’ll give you what you ask for. Don’t, and I’ll find other ways of getting it. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“How did you kill Jerry? Bacterial meningitis, I know that much. How and when did you introduce it into his system?”

Twitching his hand, Tom answers, “A poison ring. Penn military.”

Muttering a curse, Cyrus rubs his head. “Right.” Standing up, he asks, “What do you want, Tom?”

“What did you really come here for, sir? No one, not even the president, cares how I did it.”

Cyrus laughs. “Because I knew.”

Tilting his head, Tom says, “Oh. You’re somehow blaming yourself for his death. Even if you were that cruel, the job wouldn’t have been so sloppy under you. Command wouldn’t have any objections to deliberately sacrificing me, but this was a rush job more than anything. He told me to kill one of the older Grant children, gave me no parameters, and didn’t waste his time cleaning up after me. If you’d had anything to do with all of this, you would have already had me killed, sir.”

“Tell me, this ‘Command’, was it Rowan or Jake Ballard?”

Tom shakes his head. “You haven’t given me anything, yet.”

“What do you want,” Cyrus repeats.

“I want to hear why you’re blaming yourself.”

“You’re going to regret wasting the best chance you had at making things just a little more bearable for yourself, but fine: You’ve served on the Grant detail for over ten years, Tom, and in all that time, I have never seen you wear a ring. Penn military? I read your file when I first joined the campaign, and I’ve periodically re-read it over the years. You never went to Penn. And that day, I saw you wearing that ring, and I knew something wasn’t right, but I pushed it aside. If I hadn’t-”

“You might be dead,” Tom interjects. “Command hates the president for taking Olivia Pope away. He was going to make him suffer one way or another. Even if you had neutralised me without getting yourself killed, one or more of the Grant family would have still been eliminated.”

“The even worse thing is,” Cyrus says, “when gaps were found in your schedule, I defended you. I honestly thought it must have been a clerical error. You being B6-13, you hurting a child, you committing treason- It was more likely Rowan was trying to frame one of Fitz’s most loyal agents. But even then, that ring was still somewhere in the back of my head. Goodbye, Tom.”

Quickly, Tom says, “I could give you more.”

Cyrus stops. “Excuse me?”

“There is no more B6-13, but there’s still a lot of unknown information regarding it. I’m going to be in here for the rest of my life, and I don’t even know how long that life might be. I don’t get visitors. Ten minutes once a week, and I tell you something every time. Some of it might not be worth much, but some of it, you would pay much, much more than ten minutes to get your hands on it.”

“And eventually, I would pay that much, much more,” Cyrus retorts.

Leaning back, Tom replies, “You’ve never spent time in the hole or even just solitary.”

“Before here, I lived simply. Having more money in my account would go to waste. My good behaviour affords me the privileges this place offers. The guards all wear gloves, and simple physical contact between inmates isn’t allowed. Not that that’s stopped me from getting black eyes, bloody noses, and worse, but I don’t remember the last time I felt non-violent, skin-on-skin contact.”

“Outside of here, outside of B6-13, the closest thing I had to a friend was Hal. He left before any of this happened, and he probably wouldn’t visit me if he ever did find out.”

“Ten minutes,” he repeats. “Offer’s open unless someone else decides to visit me first. Then, they get all the information I have. Goodbye, Mr Beene.”

Cyrus leaves.

…

The next week, Tom smiles. “I’m not going to tell you whether it was Rowan or Ballard just yet, but whatever else you want to know, ask. One question, one answer. Until next week.”

Cyrus nods.

…

From the infirmary bed, Tom blinks. “This isn’t your day. Are you here about Helen of Troy and Rowan giving the order?”

“Normally, I would attribute that,” Cyrus gestures to Tom, “to the result of you being loopy from the pain pills, except, as it turns out, as soon as you regained consciousness, you made them take out all but your saline IV and are refusing to take so much as an aspirin. I got reprimanded by a nurse who, slap a habit on her, would make a wonderful Gothic horror nun, as if this was something I were responsible for.”

“Nurse Stacie,” Tom supplies. Closing his eyes, he says, “I’m sorry you had to deal with her, sir. I don’t take medicine, not unless it’s life or death, and since the surgery was successful, I’m probably going to live.”

“Open your eyes, Tom,” Cyrus orders.

Tom complies.

“This really shouldn’t surprise me. You don’t drink, you don’t eat birthday cake, outside of being a child-killing traitor, you played the boy scout so well because you basically are one. Oh, actually, I think they enjoy red meat, chocolate, and sodas occasionally.”

“Outside, I ate red meat,” Tom says.

“That isn’t- Moving on, I’m changing the terms of our agreement. Either you take something, now, or I don’t come back until you’re discharged. That could be several weeks, according to Sister Stacie.”

“She isn’t a nun, sir.”

“Whatever she is, if you don’t hit the call button and have her or someone else in here with pills or a needle full of drugs in the next sixty seconds, I’m walking out that door and not coming back for, at least, another week.”

“It might knock me out or make me ‘loopy’ like you said.”

“I’ll still stay the ten minutes,” Cyrus says. “Next week, you’ll just owe me two answers.”

Sighing and wincing, Tom reaches for the call button.

…

Sitting on a park bench, Cyrus looks at Tom’s bruised face and demands, “You’ve been out of prison how long?”

“The rumours I’ve always heard of Spin’s talent weren’t exaggerated,” Tom answers. “He took Rowan.”  

“And that answers my second question,” Cyrus mutters.

“Not exactly,” Tom replies. “Rowan tried to kill me. Even without that, he stopped being about the republic a long time ago and started making everything about Ms Pope. Because of her, he had me kill Jerry, get sent to prison, and then, almost bleed out on my cell floor. Charlie’s good, but you could always use someone else with our skills. Help me bring Rowan down, and whatever you want, I’ll do it for you.”

“Who’s Spin?”

“He goes by Huck, now.”

“Right, so, Olivia and, most likely, Ballard are involved in all this, too.”

“Ballard killed James Novak. Do you want him dead? To suffer? Both? Whichever, it’d be the first thing I’d do for you, after Rowan was dead,” Tom says. “Until then, if you agree, I’ll do other things for you.”

Cyrus sits quietly for a long moment. “Let’s start with how you and Rowan even got out in the first place.”

Tom nods and lets out a soft breath.


End file.
